


Of Loss, of Home

by shimadagans



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Character Study, Game: Destiny 2: Season of Dawn, Game: Destiny 2: Season of the Hunt, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Inspired by Art, M/M, Parallels, These Birds Are Gay and There Is Nothing You Can Do About It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-16 07:48:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29450283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shimadagans/pseuds/shimadagans
Summary: [Later, Saint will ask him if he won’t stay a bit longer, he will call him “my bird” if just to see the corners of Osiris’ eyes crinkle. Later still, he will say, warm and tired in the most comfortable way, “Then come home when you’re ready.”]Two parallel pieces about loss, love, and coming home at the end of it all.
Relationships: Osiris/Saint-14 (Destiny)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 51





	1. Of Home

**Author's Note:**

> Hey y'all, I'm back at it again exactly a year after my last stand-alone O14 fic with...another one.
> 
> This one was heavily inspired by [this incredible artwork](https://twitter.com/adulture/status/1357654452098895872) by the wonderful [adulture](https://twitter.com/adulture) and it really got me wanting to write again after feeling like I'd gotten into a slump so...thanks a whole bunch, deers!!!
> 
> That being said, there's a lot of feelings in this one! First chapter is from Saint's POV, and the second is from Osiris'. 
> 
> Enjoy!

When Saint-14 first emerges from the heavy, omnipresent weight of the Infinite Forest, he takes a long moment to breathe.

He doesn’t  _ need _ to breathe, truthfully, with his steel frame and the current of energy and Light steadily thrumming through him, but he does. He tilts his head this way and that, as though this freedom he’s been granted, after a long fight and a longer trek, will shimmer out of existence if he looks at it the wrong way.

It doesn’t of course, but it doesn’t stop him from looking, still. From assessing every now and then if his surroundings are real, if he’s truly in the present and not still a stalwart fixture of a not-space where nothing ever stops.

It occurs to him, distantly, that he’s not even sure if anything still works out here, after so long spent being recalibrated and  _ un _ calibrated by time and not-time--but Gepetto, bless her, pipes up to say that she’s bringing the Pigeon around and  _ wow _ Saint, doesn’t it feel good to be in the sunlight again? The  _ real _ sunlight?

He recalls dark feathers across tight shoulders. He thinks of a witty retort, edges worn soft by affection, from behind a cup of tea. His whole mind is occupied, quickly, by the feeling of warm embers keeping the cold at bay, constantly renewing, both capricious and familiar.

“Yes,” he agrees, looking at the sun and simply not seeing it, “It does.”

The Tower is quiet when they arrive, but not for long.

Saint settles in the hangar, some bizarre urge to stay near his ship keeping him from taking the quarters offered to him by a rather insistent Zavala. The Commander says something about a hero’s welcome, and while Saint is listening, he’s also preoccupied.

How strange it is, to look at his fellow Titan and see  _ change _ . The Vex had plenty of outcomes to show him, plenty of facsimiles of his comrades to parade around him, taunting him with what could, should, would happen, but this--this is something the Vex did not have the imagination for. The weight on Zavala’s shoulders that sags into his words belies the years that have passed, and it’s more of a confirmation than any numbers could be.

After that come the well-wishers, the starry-eyed, the not-quite-believers. Many come to see, some to outright gawk, fewer still to speak with him directly.

Saint finds he cannot blame them; even in their line of work, Guardians lost in this fashion, for this long...he died, didn’t he? But he didn’t, the Guardian saved him, Osiris saved him. These two things are simultaneously true, and when the throng of people has eventually dispersed and given way to evening’s chill, he goes through the motions of cleaning his equipment. The Paradox seems just a bit heavier than usual.

He ducks into his ship’s interior and settles into the bunk when the chill starts making his joints feel stiff, resolving to go through the backlog of Vanguard messages he’s sure have built up, to get a better grip on the situation he now finds himself in, and pauses.

There are no less than a few dozen new messages on the private channel he has with Osiris.

He almost drops the datapad he’d pulled up--a bit more grounding than just having Gepetto read everything to him--in his efforts to pull up the log. There’s a strange feeling in his chest when he looks at the dates of each message, some dating centuries back.

One is from today, so he starts there. It’s benign, neutral; just a simple “Welcome back,” and little else.

He thumbs over the edge of the datapad with a few centuries of tenderness and scrolls up to the oldest of the unread messages.

The log’s tone ranges from bitter stubbornness to pained longing, rare for Osiris even in private. He has always been proud, and for good reason, Saint thinks--who could hold a candle to a burning blaze and even suggest they are the same?

He scrolls back down with heavy, careful hands to send off a “Thank you, we will see each other soon.”

The next day brings more visitors. Ikora Rey is among them. She brings him a worn box he recognizes instantly, and a wooden crate he does not. A single glance from her scatters the other visitors so they have some semblance of privacy.

The first box has many of his personal effects in it, the ones he did not dare bring with him in his haste to do  _ something _ to stop Osiris’ mad chase. Letters, little bird figurines--things he did not think he would miss as much as he suddenly does, looking up from the box and at the Warlock across from him. Not just a Warlock, now, a member of the Vanguard, with a smile on her face that sits as if she hasn’t used it in a long while.

There are other belongings in the box, too. Things Osiris left behind as well.

When Saint looks up again to voice a question, Ikora shakes her head, wistful, “He was gone for a long time, as well. He didn’t come back for them, and said something about feeling ‘unwelcome’.” Her face twists on the last word, and Saint does not press further. 

She hands him the second, unfamiliar box instead, and inside are various ingredients, satchels of fragrant tea. Her smile is more present when he asks what this is all for. “Since you refuse to take a room,” she says, “I thought it might help make your ship feel like home,” and Saint is reminded of the cleverness that hides in the space between a Warlock’s thoughts.

Later, after he has said many hellos and heard many thank yous, he turns a small bird figure over in his hands, once, twice...he loses count eventually, thinking about what he might do, now.

Osiris has not yet responded to his message when he checks for the twenty-eighth time today.

“Tomorrow,” he says, to the pigeons who roost around his ship, as if they have always slept there, “I will go into the City and get you more birdseed.”

Days pass, as they do now, and Saint dutifully keeps track of each one, of how each is different. The sky looks different, he sees different people, and he convinces himself that this is real. Shaxx convinces him one day to make sure his Light hasn’t “grown dull” and Saint finds delight in proving to both the Crucible handler and himself that it has not.

Osiris responds to his message, eventually, but he dodges the plain question, as Saint expected him to. He snorts so loudly he wakes one of the pigeons when he reads the reply--many things change, but ultimately, this has not. Osiris flies in the face of standard and skirts around questioning until it pleases him to answer. Instead, they send messages back and forth sporadically over the course of the weeks. The Tower, the City...they start to feel closer to ‘home’, but there’s an absence he feels keenly.

Saint aches to see him, of course, but...after this long, what are a few more days?

Then, one day, out of the blue, he is there, unannounced. It is already dark out, most of the Hangar’s engineers and technicians have left their posts, and Saint is considering leaving his, scattering a few last handfuls of seed for his flock when quiet footsteps pluck at his sensors. He almost drops the bag of seed before quickly setting it aside when he sees the familiar tickle of early-black feathers in his periphery. 

Even as Osiris approaches, certainty in every step, Saint isn’t sure he is real, that this is real. He tilts his head this was and that, appraising him. Osiris is lacking his helmet, a detail Saint startles himself with. The face scarf stays in place until Osiris comes close enough to touch, and this close, there is no denying the flare of Osiris’ Light. It’s like the first rays of sunlight that touched his armor when he exited the Forest but stronger, brighter.

Osiris reaches for him at the same moment Saint reaches out, and Osiris’ scarf falls just in time for Saint to tuck his frame against his chest.

There are a million and one things he wants to say, so he starts with the first one: “You are late.”

“I am right on time, as always,” Osiris argues, but it’s as meek as he can be and muffled against warming metal as he gets his arms around as much of Saint as he can.

Later, Saint will ask him if he won’t stay a bit longer, he will call him “my bird” if just to see the corners of Osiris’ eyes crinkle. Later still, he will say, warm and tired in the most comfortable way, “Then come home when you’re ready.”

Now, however, the world is his to hold.


	2. Of Loss

The life of a Guardian is largely a life of loss. Osiris knows this well.

How many Lights had he seen snuffed out before the City’s walls had reached their apex? How many after? How many times had he draped the Vanguard emblem over what remains could be recovered of yet another of the Traveler’s lost soldiers and told himself “Never again,” only to turn around and do the whole somber charade once more?

He is no stranger to personal loss, either. He recalls the moment he realized he could no longer find Saint’s signature in the Infinite Forest, as bent on chasing him as he was, as foolish Osiris had been not to tell him to leave, or to leave himself. No, Saint’s trace disappeared in an instant, a thread lost among the great tapestry of the Forest, and Osiris thought surely, even then, he could learn something from the bone-deep ache the revelation caused.

None of that compares to the absence of Sagira’s Light.

It is a shock at first, coupled with frustration--at himself, at her, at the gaunt grin of the High Celebrant’s war call. He throws himself into work because it is all he knows how to do at the moment, and finds himself questioning thin air when he’d usually expect a snide remark in return.

For the first few weeks, it stuns him. It worries nearly everyone around him. Eventually he manages to catch himself before he asks nobody in particular a question about the nature of a portal or the most efficient frequency to run something through.

He knows they mean well, the others. The Guardian makes the most effort to act like not much has happened, but even without Sagira, he can feel the prickle of that new power they’d cultivated on Europa as they work--they are no stranger to loss, either, and if they won’t ask him, he won’t ask them.

Crow is often a welcome, if not green presence in his days, too. His seemingly never-ending questions about how things work and why remind Osiris of himself, demanding knowledge from Felwinter in the dim light of a well-stocked library, a long time ago.

It’s those who have known him longer that truly tug at the edges of the festering wound. Ikora brings tea and conversation, and when she brings up his Ghost so casually, he snaps at her the first few times, prideful and hurt. She merely fixes him with a placid look, pours him more tea and says “She was a friend to me, too.”

He grounds himself with the teacup in his hands as a centerpiece, bit by bit clawing down the image that Xivu Arath surely wants him to present: the anger, the rage, the hurt. “Sometimes I thought she liked you better than me,” Osiris says, eventually, after too long, but Ikora smiles and the tension drains from both of their shoulders just a bit. She comes back, week after week, and eventually, it hurts less when she mentions Sagira. 

He and Saint send messages back and forth on a somewhat regular basis, but he goes hours, hours without pausing in his work and knows in his bones that he is no longer strong enough to see Saint in person. He feels, almost, that he doesn’t  _ deserve _ to see him, yet. He knows this is not a rational thought, and yet, still it sits, resting in the corner of his mind like a sleeping predator.

There are...others he knows he could, perhaps  _ should _ seek out, but he foresees their conversations going nowhere fast, nowhere useful. He will talk to them soon, at some point, eventually, when he feels more like a person and less like a puppet cut loose. He turns back to his work and tells himself that he has no time right now to feel ridiculous things like  _ lonely _ .

It’s a few more weeks before their work bears fruit, but between himself, the sheer will of the Guardian, and Crow’s newfound drive, they take down the High Celebrant. It feels less like a victory and more like the end of a long, fruitless day of work with more just ahead, but he tries, he tries to feel something other than empty.

The morning after, Osiris goes down to the very center of the City, where he sits right under the massive shape of the Traveler.

(Nobody stops him, though he reminds himself that now it wouldn’t be much of a fight if they wanted to. Perhaps that’s why he’s...allowed. Pity.)

He looks up at the underside of the object of his past ire and feels...blank. He used to stare out the window during his talks with the Speaker and glare daggers at this thing the Speaker swore would leave them but now it just feels like he’s waiting for the other shoe to drop. “You will leave,” Osiris says, and now he thinks he might believe it, “But when?”

The Traveler, of course, does not respond, and Osiris feels all at once more lost and more filled with purpose.

Ikora intercepts him on his way back to his little living space--she’s holding a datapad which means she means business. She ushers him into the little nook near her post where they often take their tea and he sits across from her with some amount of apprehension.

“I’ve heard that your work against the High Celebrant was a success,” she starts with, and Osiris nods and doesn’t try to smile in return. “Good,” she continues, and she sounds like she means it, her fingers tightening around the edges of the datapad for just a moment. He’s reminded of the viciousness in her eyes when she recalls her Crucible days. “I might have more work for you, if you’re interested,” she adds, after a moment, and Osiris turns to fully appraise her expression, coming away with the impression that she expects him to agree.

“You’ve probably already gotten the assent from anyone else involved,” he states, and she’s already pulling up a diagram on the datapad, “What kind of work?”

“Advisory,” she says, and it stings less than he thought it would, “Zavala’s advisor, specifically. There’s a situation, with a new Cabal faction…”

Later, before the sun starts setting, Osiris stands in that same nook, rotating his prophecy cubes in his hands to give them something to do while he thinks. There’s easy conversation all around him, the little soup stall across the way in the full lunch-hour swing, and he doesn’t feel quite at peace but…

It’s something.

Perhaps it’s selfish of him, to be glad there’s some either crisis on the horizon, to give him less time to work through the rats’ nest that is his grief, but it is what it is. He’s ruminating on just what sorts of grandstanding he and Zavala might encounter at this meeting they’ve arranged when heavy footsteps come down the long hall and into the bazaar.

Normally he’d just brush it off as just another Guardian but the buzz of conversation shifts into an air of reverence, and Osiris turns and lifts his head, the curve of the ‘beak’ catching sunlight just in time for him to see Saint step into the little alcove, holding a container of some sort.

“Osiris!” he exclaims, because of course he does, wasting no time in setting what he’s brought with him and taking off his helmet. Even without his Ghost, he can feel the cool, unwavering pull of Saint’s Light as he comes close. A deep breath in gives him ozone, soft metal, and…

“Is that..?” He can’t even finish his question before Saint is beaming back at him, lavender light spilling from between his faceplates, eyes slanted in an exuberant, proud grin. “Yes! The almond cookies you like so much, from that one place way back, near the salvage plant!” Saint opens the container and from what little he can see from around Saint’s pointed shoulders and thick frame, that’s not all he’s brought.

“They had to move buildings after the Cabal stomped through the City, but they reopened just across the street! Do you remember Miriam, Osiris? The little girl? She is so  _ grown _ now, she runs the shop. She assured me, the cookies smell  _ exactly _ the same though, see--”

Saint shoves a cookie into his face and Osiris takes it with grateful hands while Saint busies himself setting up what seems to be a little lunch spread for them both. He listens to every word carefully, like Saint’s idle chatter is clearing some of the fog from his head.

“--Pah! I will have to try harder to keep up with the young Guardians. Did you hear about that Crow, using Warlock techniques with his Hunter abilities? I keep telling the Guardian that they will have to show me some of their tricks but--ah.” Saint clears his throat when Osiris takes an audible bite of his cookie, and he peers at Osiris with a little more softness in his tone, “Congratulations on your promotion.”

Osiris chances a glance at Ikora out of the corner of his eye and shakes his head before settling on a simple “Thank you.”

Saint balks at him. Then, he laughs.

“Who are you and what have you done with the real Osiris?” he manages, after clearing his throat once more. Osiris feels the corners of his mouth lifting without his input.

“I am fully allowed to give thanks, Saint,” he quips in return, and the Titan dusts off his hands before joining Osiris near the railing. He doesn’t quite crowd him against it, as he might’ve once done. They are older now, they have changed, at least somewhat.

He feels Saint sigh just as much as he hears it as he brings a careful hand up to pull Osiris’ scarf down, thumb coming to rest right by his ear. “Does this mean you will be roosting here for a while?” Saint asks, quieter than before, and Osiris forgets for a moment about most of his worries, taking a long moment to just study the arch of Saint’s faceplates just like this.

“For a while,” he agrees, tentatively resting a hand at Saint’s waist. It’s been a long time since he’s done this particular dance, but it seems like the right thing to do when Saint hums back at him, “Good, good. If that is the case, then perhaps,” he looks thoughtful for a moment, “I wonder if those quarters the Vanguard tried to push me into are still available…”

“Trying to cage me in so I won’t fly into danger?” Osiris asks in return, though any ire he might’ve once said it with is dust on the wind in lazy sunlight. Sagira would laugh at him, tell him he’s going soft again. 

Today, the thought doesn’t hurt, wistful as it is.

“No, my bird,” Saint insists, low, and he knows that few things are as sure as a promise from Saint-14, “Just offering you a perch to rest on. A home for us both.”

With one hand on Saint’s arm and one at his waist, and with Saint’s hand cupping his jaw, Osiris feels more at home than he has in a very, very long time.

Later, there will be discussions and planning and frustration and hurt, of course. Theirs is a life of loss, after all.

But Osiris looks up at the one true boon of his long life and feels the tug of a small, secret smile, and he turns away from that inevitability, if only for a moment.

“For us both,” he agrees, and Saint’s smile outshines the sun.

  
  



End file.
